Beams
by chairdesklamp
Summary: Titled for a Kuroyume single with the most '90s PV possible. A study in Ichigo and Karin, Grimmjow, Nel and Tia. A brief look into the things they're not saying, and the rot it causes their bonds. Also, spot the hidden song title snuck into the dialogue! KSH verse-see profile.


「QUIET反応をしてない

HABIT訪れるWORST・COMMUNICATION

抜け出たらいいね

LOSINGきっかけがいない」ー「BEAMS],黒夢

Ichigo laid his school bag at the front entry.

The living was empty, but the smell of butter and sizzling of a pan alerted him to at least the presence of one of his sisters.

As luck would have it, Yuzu was the current occupant-Karin hated cooking, after all-and turned to beam at him when he approached the kitchen.

"I'm sorry about the rubbish, but it might drip. I'm trying out a new recipie with sea urchin, but frying such thin greens in something with such a low smoke point as butter is new to me," she shouted over the oven hood fan and crackling pan.

"It sounds great, though!" Ichigo beamed right back.

"By the way, where is everyone else?"

"Mmh, Dad and big brother Grimmjow are with a paitient, big sister Nel was sent to fetch some vaccines we're out of, big sister Rukia is out back pulling weeds, and Karin is...out being Karin, I guess!"

Ichigo sighed inwardly at just _whose_ information was missing, but outwardly laughed as did Yuzu.

"Well, let me know if you need help!"

"Oh, big brother Ichigo, you're so sweet! But I'd rather eat Bostov than your cooking!"

The fact that he shared that sentiment-to a degree; Ichigo knew Bostov's true identity-seemed to make it an okay disparaging joke for the otherwise considerate-of-everyone-but-herself Yuzu.

And perhaps, that was the thread between her and he.

Leaving the kitchen, he gazed at Karin's favourite spot on the sofa.

Was it truly?

That night, so many years ago. The hole ripped out of his mum as she begged him not to be scared with her last breaths as blood ran down him down her through the grass as he screamed for help as the rain poured down-

The night the week before when she threatened to take Karin and Yuzu and stay with Kisuke, or in a car and they'd fought for Ichigo's life, and she feared the hormone therapy, and he'd found them, and he was in tears, and he promised still, that he would give in, and his dad had been on his side.

Karin had never spoken a thing, but he saw it in her eyes.

Karin never spoke to him anymore, not more than was necessary for two people living together. Perfunctory, at best.

In her eyes, their mother's blood that had bathed him covered him still.

As the sun set behind the house, Issin shook his head, refusing the bowl on his turn as he looked pointedly between the two siblings now in his employ.

"I think...you two could use the rest."

He stood, streching out a stiff back-a feeling shared by all three on the porch, "I'm gonna go upstairs and shower and change before dinner."

With that, he retreated, closing the door behind him.

Nel gave her older brother a worried frown as he took a puff from the bow, "It's been a week. Have you talked to her?"

Grimmjow coughed as he passed the bowl to her-but whether it was of suprise or of marijuana smoke, she couldn't and he wouldn't tell.

Grimmjow gazed back at the sibling of his that he had to remind himself was asking in their family's best interest and not a lack of empathy.

"You know damn well I can't, Nel. You know what he did."

His eyes widened as Nel exhaled with a soft cough and passed the pipe back.

"He tried to _kill you_ -and almost suceeded! Fuck, Nel, I-"

He picked up the bowl and took a deep inhale both for the calming effects of the drug and deep breathing at once.

After clearing his coughs, he looked to the ground as he fisted the legs of his scrub trousers.

"For seven years in that shithole, Nel... I'd thought he succeeded, too."

Nel puffed and passed back, contemplating how to say what she was going to say. Her mind was turning a bit slow to find the words, and she wondered if perhaps the talk would have been best to have before and mull over while getting high.

"The thing is, Tia's hurting, too. And being hurt, also. I.. I've heard things from most everyone else still at Uncle Tessai's."

Grimmjow passed the pipe to Nel after one last puff and held up a hand to signal that he was done-there was little actual plant left, anyway.

"She wasn't alone with him-she could've ditched him, and I, for one, would've backed her up 200 percent!"

Nel swallowed thickly, "So would I, and Pesche and Don. And I don't forgive what he did to you, to them, to me! And I don't forgive what he's doing to Tia, either, but-!"

Grimmjow lowered his voice, even and almost cold, "But nothing-she knows all this, and she keeps him around. Around herself, around us..."

Grimmjow buried his face in his hands, and Nel, scooted over to drape herself over him in a wobbly embrace, the pipe emptied into the soggy grass and laid on the stair.

"She's our big sister," Nel said through a clogged throat and shaky voice, "I don't wanna believe she just doesn't care like that."

Grimmjow kept his head down and reached an arm around Nel to return her embrace.

"I don't, either, but it's clear as the fucking sky."

"WATCH OUT!" Karin shouted as the football flew through the air and toward a man on the sidewalk.

Despite the large bass guitar strapped to his back, Chad turned and caught the ball in his hands, calmly bringing it to Karin.

"Here you are, Karin. How are you?"

Karin took the ball under one arm and shrugged with the other shoulder.

"Not bad, just playing soccer. You been out practising?"

"Hm?" Chad asked, then looked as Karin pointed to his instrument as if he'd forgotten it was there, "Oh, I took to a repair shop. Strings."

"Ooh, Kurosaki's got a cruuuush~," taunted a boy on the far end of the field from her.

"Fuck off or I'll crush your skull, Ikeda!"

She turned back to Chad, who wore a small smirk.

"I'm gonna get back to my game... My team's winning!"

Chad gave a thumb-up, "Good luck."

"Thanks1"

Karin smiled and ran off.

 _Why couldn't big brother Ichigo be like that-so fussless?_

Tia sat in front of the cracked mirror of the apartment she and Noitora had just moved into upon Yoruichi and her partners-parents of small children-learning of Noitora's true capacity and examined the bruise beneath her collarbone just right of her left shoulder.

She'd gotten it by flinging herself back when she'd tried to throw him, and he was cradling an ice pack on his head instead of refusing her "no"...

So it wasn't all that bad, was it?

She thought of Nel. Of Don, and Pesche, and Grimmjow.

They'd all just run out on her.

Certainly, she was their _elder_ sister, only younger than Francesca and Renji-but how much did that matter when everyone concerned was over thirty?

"Some sister you are," Hiyori, the cafe's repairwoman, had commented the other day.

Shinji had shook his head as he pulled a fresh batch of dorayaki from the oven to be displayed in the front case, "No one is to blame. You're all hurt, you all are hurting, you all are getting hurt... No one besides Scumbucket is to blame, anyway. He _is._ But the rest of you..."

He yelled to Coyote, who sat in the customer area of Urahara cafe, and had abandoned his lunch break ritual of beef donburi and the paper to watch intently what was going on with his daughter and co-workers.

Shinji looked him square in the face, "We need to get Scumbucket out of here and lock your kids in a room together until they understand each other again."

Returning from her head to the reflection of her bruised shoulder, Tia closed her eyes.

Other than her father, she doubted anyone would understand.


End file.
